"It was all in the name of justice!"
"I blame you for all the bad things in my life up until now!"
Protector of Silence
Chapter Twenty-Six - Oh for the love of peanuts!
"I swear if one more person pinches or punches me, I will punch them into next week!"
Nick looked up from the homework he was completing in the common room. He looked over at Liam who was at the base of one of the sofas, finishing off his square-foot Lego castle. The blond was genuinely pleased with his work.
'Did Kate just threaten someone?' they both thought, eyebrows raised.
Sure enough, seconds later, Kate came storming up the stairs into the common room, fists clenched, blue eyes blazing with cold fire. She plonked herself down on the other sofa, not the one Liam was sitting near, folding her arms and legs and muttering words under her breath that a good eleven-year-old girl shouldn't know.
'What did some poor soul do to her to make her this angry?' Nick couldn't help but wonder. Liam looked like he couldn't be less bothered and went back to making adjustments to one of his turrets.
Not long after this all happened, Kellyn and Keith made their way into the common room. Kellyn was carrying his school books whilst Keith was carrying...the equivalent of a tonne of mud on his body.
"Dare I ask?" Nick raised one eyebrow at Keith.
Keith shrugged, sat down on the floor close to Liam and pulled his own large Lego castle (his was of red Legos instead of green Legos) out from under the sofa.
Kellyn answered Nick's question.
"He fell in a puddle and crashed into a tree?" Nick read, blinking.
"It was all in the name of justice!" Keith pointed to the sky dramatically.
Kellyn shook his head in exasperation.
He was chasing a styler thief in order to clear his name
"Oh yeah, Mr Kincaid mentioned that" Nick nodded "So, whodunnit?"
A creep
Nick blinked and repeated this in confusion.
"A crazy creep!" Keith added "Hooked nose and all! And he wanted to become a ranger!"
"And he stole a bunch of stylers?" Nick blinked "Well he's off to a flying start."
Keith just nodded before returning his attention to his castle. Then he frowned.
"Hey!" he demanded "Where's my knights?! And my king?!"
Liam smirked evilly. "They are my captives"
He jerked his head to the corner of his own castle. Keith's little Lego people were cornered between a tower and the main wall by two dragons and five cannons.
"Oi!" Keith jumped to his feet "Give me back my peoples!"
He jumped forward to save his little Lego people, but Liam noticed in horror that the act would destroy his castle and pushed the ginger boy back onto his rear. An all-out battle ensued, involving Lego limbs flying, plastic cannonballs pelting everything, a broken Lego wall ("LIAM I'M GONNA KILL YA!"), hair yanking, nose pulling, screams of both pain and rage and the destruction of the Great Dragon of the Bane. Miraculously, they didn't have the brains to use any table legs, vases, etc. as weapons before Keith finally rescued his Lego people. With a huff of annoyance, the ginger plunked himself down on the carpet, purposely not looking at Liam as he began to reconstruct his broken wall. The blond grumbled something he had obviously picked up from his older brother and began to remake his 'dead' dragon.
"O-key..." Nick and Kellyn were just staring at the scene. Nick finally decided to break the silence. "So, what's up with Kate?"
Dunno. She's been complaining about people punching and pinching her.
"Oh, I get it" Nick smiled. Kellyn blinked in confusion. "Here I'll show you." He beckoned Kellyn to stand next to the table. He pinched Kellyn's arm and then punched it. "Pinch, punch, first of the month."
Kellyn was still blinking in confusion, but now looked a little annoyed; he could see where Kate was going with this.
"It's the first of February" Nick explained "It's a tradition for the first of a month."
Kellyn frowned.
That's a stupid tradition
"Meh, maybe" Nick shrugged "Some don't think so."
"IT'S HOPELESS!"
Nick and Kellyn turned their heads to Liam, who had his head thrown back, eyes screwed shut and was wailing as if in anguish, holding the largest four pieces of his broken dragon.
"I'VE LOST HIM! HE'S DEAD! DEAD!" he wailed. Then his eyes turned murderous "YOU DRAGON MURDERER!"
He pounced on Keith, punching him repeatedly in the jaw. Keith, who had no warning beyond Liam's yelling, which he was always doing, found himself pinned against the floor on his back with a crazy blond kneeling on his mid-section and trying to dent his face in. After a few stunned seconds though, he began to fight back.
Should we help him?
"Nah" Nick shook his head "He'll be fine." He looked up from his homework. "Wait, you did mean Keith right?"
Kellyn paused, then shrugged. He pointed at the two of them and then whirled his finger at the side of his head.
"Yeah, I've gotta agree with you there" Nick nodded.
Starlight walked up the steps into the common room now. He looked at Liam and Keith fighting, shook his head and then, plainly wanting nothing to do with it, walked into the boys' dorm room.
"RHYTHMI!" A voice bellowed from the other side of the room, along with a lot of banging.
Kellyn and Nick turned their heads towards the bathroom door. Becs was standing in front of it, banging on it with her powerful fist so hard the boys were amazed the door didn't have a hole in it right now.
"HURRY UP!" the dark-haired girl bellowed "Your pretty enough without make-up! Now get your pretty little face outta there! I need the toilet! RHYTHMI!"
"What?!" Becs blinked in confusion; she spun around to see Rhythmi standing behind her, looking irritated.
"Huh? What?!" Becs spluttered "But...what?...I..." She looked at the door "But then who...?" The her eyes narrowed "KEITH! STOP MESSING ON WITH YOUR HAIR!"
"It's not me!" Keith yelped, still trying to get Liam to stop punching him "Somebody help me out here!"
"I'd help you out Keith, but unfortunately I'm being cornered in the bathroom by the Incredible Hulk's daughter...on steroids."
At the sound of the voice in the bathroom, Becs immediately went red with anger again. She rammed her fist into the bathroom door and one could almost hear wood splintering.
"SAMI!" she roared "GET OUT OF THIS BATHROOM RIGHT NOW!"
"Who's to say it's me?" the voice tried, now becoming very low and boyish.
"'Cos I've seen nearly all the boys!" Becs hissed "Ponte's eating marshmallows and Isaac would never offer to help Keith out of anything! And you're the only girl besides me who would try that trick of imitating a boy's voice! Now, GET OUT!"
Sami meeped.
Kellyn stopped listening after that.
"Oh thank Arceus!" Keith gasped as Liam abandoned bashing his face in in order to play on the Nintendo Wii. His nose was bleeding, so Keith dug out a handkerchief to try and stop it "Yeah! Thanks for helping out girls!" Pointedly ignoring Kellyn and Nick, he frowned at Sami and Rhythmi who were making their way back to the girls' dorm. They smartly ignored him. "Not like you would've been able to do anything."
"What was that, Keith?" Kate growled, evidently hearing it perfectly enough though. Keith, in all his stupidity, didn't realise this.
"I'm just saying girls are no good at fighting compared to bo-..." Keith didn't get to say anymore, because then Kate smashed him with a pillow so hard he fell over backwards.
Kellyn winced. Geez; Kate was stronger than she looked.
"You moron! You can be really mean when you want to be, Keith!" she hissed.
Keith spluttered, trying to get his voice back.
"This coming from the one who just assaulted me with a pillow?!" he complained "I might have to tell Miss April you're way more violent than she knows!"
"Am not!" Another pillow smack.
"Oh yeah! 'Cos hitting me is really gonna prove ya point!"
Kate finally growled one last time, but realised Keith had a point and returned to the sofa.
"I'm surrounded by lunatics" Nick muttered, shaking his head and he went back to his homework.
Kellyn just nodded in agreement.
"ARGHHHHHHHH!"
'Oh Arceus what now?!' Nick groaned internally. Keith glanced at the game of Mariokart Liam was playing. The little Koopa Troopa character was spinning around in circles, making what sounded like dizzy squeaking noises, whilst Liam's knuckles had turned white and his uneven teeth were grinding together in seething anger.
"Liam, you just hit a car" Keith informed him, even though it was obvious he knew that.
"It came out of nowhere!" Liam complained, trying to claw back his pride "It was unavoidable!"
"It was bright red!" Keith protested "And parked at the side of the road!"
Liam had no argument, but roared with anger.
"YOU!" he roared at Keith for no explicable reason "I blame you for all the bad things in my life up until now! After now, I blame Nick!"
Nick blinked, wondering what he had done to Liam to deserve this. Liam and Keith meanwhile began another fist fight.
"Oh for the love of peanuts!" Kate yelled, exasperated, before storming downstairs.
Kellyn quickly decided to follow her, the craziness and randomness being too much for him. Keith's nose chose then to start bleeding again.
"I agree with her!" the ginger groaned, trying to use his already blood-stained handkerchief to stop the nosebleed "Oh for peanut's sake, why's it always me getting beat up?!"
He rushed towards the kitchen, probably because the one and only bathroom was still being used by Becs. With one final yowl of anger, Liam stormed off into the boys' dorm, probably going to rant on to Ponte about the unfairness of life.
"Ah, peace and quiet" Nick sighed in relief, picking up his pen again and scanning over what he had already written "Thank peanuts."
Kellyn stretched as he made his way outside from the courtyard. After the randomness of that afternoon, he has spent the rest of the day in the library with Isaac and Ponte, though Ponte only came in to eat his marshmallows in peace.
The sun was now setting and the sky was inked in colours of honey-yellow, faded-orange and cotton-candy-pink. Since the bell for dinner hadn't rung yet, Kellyn decided to go and visit the Pledge Stone. He wasn't sure why, he just knew he had to. Something was drawing him to it.
As if his body was on auto-pilot, he made his way across the field and down the steps to the Ascension Square. He was surprised by what he saw there. Or should I say, who. Two figures, sitting near the water's edge. One was rather tall, even whilst sitting down, and looked to be entering his teens. His silver hair shimmered amber in the light of the setting sun. The other was smaller, Kellyn's age, and was giggling. Her ginger hair seemed fire-red in the dying light.
'Starlight and Kate?'
Kellyn slowly made his way over to them, unsure of why they were sitting here like this. If the two of them came together, surely they should be sitting next to each other rather than a metre or so apart, although the idea of that strangely made Kellyn's heart clench. These thoughts made him zone out for a second, which was just long enough for him to step on a twig. The cliché crunching sound was enough to make both Kate and Starlight turn around in their seats.
"Hi Kellyn!" Kate smiled with a small wave "You came down here too?"
Kellyn just nodded.
"Keith, Liam and Ponte were playing a rather disruptive game in the common room, something to do with turtles and whatnot driving cars" Starlight explained "So we decided to watch the sunset. You want to join us?"
Kellyn paused but, figuring he didn't have anything to lose, shrugged with agreement. He joined them by the sea's edge, sitting between them and succumbing to their content silence and peacefulness. Since they were facing east, they couldn't see the setting sun, but the sunset was still beautiful. Blood-red lingered on the darkening horizon whilst buttercup-yellow curved above them like the inside of a snow globe, trapping a few pink-stained clouds below it's surface. The dying light reflected on the calm ocean, making it look like the whole water was a blazing body of fire.
"It's beautiful" Kate sighed.
"We should come here more often" Starlight nodded. Kellyn agreed with that. "It's moments like these that are worth existing for."
'You were never supposed to exist.'
The mood instantly plummeted as Kellyn remembered Owari's words. He lowered his head with the smallest of sighs.
'I'm a paradox? An anomaly? What does that mean? How am I not normal? How is it I even exist in the first place? I don't understand. I don't have all the answers to these questions.' He sighed. 'Maybe Owari knows the answers. But will he tell me them? I doubt it, I can never understand what he's saying even when he gives me a straight answer. Or maybe he'd just kill me first; after all, that was what he was initially sent to do...'
Vatonage.
Kellyn was unsure why the word Principle Lamont had taught them just that morning came into his head now. But it did, almost as if someone had planted it there.
'The light submerged in darkness' he remembered 'Is there any light in all this darkness? Is there light in a paradox? Hmm, maybe...' He looked at the ones sitting either side of him, their eyes wide as they drank in the stunning scenery. 'My friends? Could they be my light?' He smiled 'That sounds nice.'
"KEITH DAZURU! PONTE RONKO! LIAM NELSON!"
'...That, on the other hand, doesn't.'
"FOR THE LOVE OF PEANUTS, HOW MANY TIMES MUST I GIVE YOU DETENTIONS BEFORE YOU GET THE MESSAGE?! NO RUNNING IN THE HALLWAYS!"
Kellyn snorted with laughter. Kate giggled at Kincaid's yelling.
"Seriously, what is it with all the peanuts?" Starlight shook his head in exasperation.
Kellyn shrugged.
"I don't know" Kate also shrugged "Maybe it's another first-of-the-month thing. Or maybe I started a craze."
Then Kellyn wrote something they both laughed at:
I hate peanuts